


Broken Noses, Mending Fences

by Gabriel4Sam



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Friends to Exasperated Colleagues to Lovers, M/M, Overworked Mace Windu, The Jedi would like the galaxy to handle its own problems sometimes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-04
Updated: 2019-05-04
Packaged: 2020-02-18 16:39:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,013
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18703420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gabriel4Sam/pseuds/Gabriel4Sam
Summary: Qui-Gon is one of the best Jedi Mace Windu knows, but the ratio of the problems he solves and the problems he creates is ridiculous. The logical solution is to go with him on his next mission and try to understand why things explode so much, every time Master Jinn sets foot on a new planet.





	Broken Noses, Mending Fences

**Author's Note:**

> I would like to thank myurbandream and happygiraffe, who worked with me for this bigbang, for their patience with my tardiness, my habits to forget to check my fandom mail and my broken english.  
> You're awesome and it was a real pleasure playing in the Star Wars fandom with you!

 

“That’s it, I can’t take it anymore,” Mace Windu snarls, smacking his fist on the arm of his chair, something he hasn’t done in all his years on the Jedi Council, despite the Senate, the state of the galaxy and every bad idea his Jedi brethren can have.

 

Standing in the middle of the Council room, Qui-Gon Jinn doesn’t have the decency to look ashamed. He just puffs out his chest and looks at Mace like Mace is the unreasonable one. Qui-Gon isn’t wearing his cloak, his tunics are terribly unkempt, and he’s deeply in need of a shower, or perhaps of someone to attack him with a high-pressure water spray. His shields are tight, probably in a vain effort to not let his pain be seen by the Council. Mace is sure the idiot has two cracked ribs. And someone broke his nose. Again. Slightly to the left, a foot behind, Obi-Wan Kenobi, the man’s Padawan, has the long-suffering expression of someone used to Qui-Gon’s attics. The younger Jedi made an effort to straighten his appearance before entering the Council Room, but he’s missing his cloak too, and something that looks like mould is moving slightly on his pants. He also has a split lip. And sitting on Obi-Wan’s hip is the child regent of some backwater Outer Rim world, who is, of course, religiously forbidden to leave that world.

 

Adi is sitting just on the right of Mace, and as she probably understands Mace’s need to strangle the big idiot, she doesn’t let him speak anymore after that first explosion.

 

Instead, she takes command of the debriefing, as regal and poised as ever:

“We’re all ears, Master Jinn. Explain to us why restarting a war after a century of peace seemed like a good idea.”

 

“And it better be good,” Jocasta Nu grumbles on Adi’s other side, probably less quiet that she believes she is.

 

“The Force suggested to me-“ Qui-Gon starts, and the entire Council groans as Qui-Gon Jinn starts a tale that could seem like a model of Jedi wisdom, if you listened to him, but sure sounds like Qui-Gon Jinn doing what he wants, like he wants, when he wants, and not caring even a little bit if three solar systems are now armed to the teeth and ready to go to war.

 

It isn’t that Qui-Gon Jinn likes chaos. It isn’t that Qui-Gon likes giving the Senate Diplomatic Service more work, giving Mace an ulcer, or destabilizing whole sectors.

 

In fact, the man has, in his career, successfully negotiated the ending of three major space conflicts and a lot of planetary disputes. He has charmed power-hungry politicians into coming to the negotiation tables and behaving. Mace suspects he charmed the pants off of them quite a lot, too, but it always seemed everybody was quite happy to part on good terms after, so he always refused to ask too precise questions during the debriefs.

 

But all that, all the successful treaties, peaceful resolutions, and other positives results, all that was Pre-Xanatos.

 

Post-Xanatos Qui-Gon’s vision of the world has been tainted in black and white and the man the Council had known, the man who had been known to coax peace from the most narrow-minded, crooked politicians like it was an art, has forgotten that not all his adversaries in the negotiating rooms are sociopaths, bent on the suffering of the weak, the poor, the other sentient species, or whoever is the victim this week in Qui-Gon’s mind.

Sometimes, politicians can be slowly guided to a better alternative than the one they wanted at the beginning. Most of them really want to see the galaxy in peace and people happy, if it doesn’t shake up their old habits too much. Or if the negotiations are smooth enough that they don’t realize it will shake those habits. But it’s a difficult result to obtain when the Jedi in charge of negotiations start them by calling them a disgrace to their planets, or other less than stellar diplomatic performances by Qui-Gon.

 

Qui-Gon doesn’t seem to believe it’s really an interesting negotiation until there is metaphorical blood on the floor, and sometimes even not metaphorical.

And he handles his debrief with the Council in the exact same way.

As Master Jinn digs himself deeper into the Council’s bad graces, Mace wishes for a drink.

“It’s like he wants to make our lives harder,” Mace comments later, in the training rooms with Adi. She hmms, something meaningless, and attacks again. It’s the middle of the night, they had meetings upon meetings all day, and the adrenaline of their fight will push sleep even later in the night, but sometimes, when it’s too much, when the galaxy seems so decided to burn, no matter how many fires they put out, going at each other as violently as they can is the only thing stopping them from going crazy.

Sometimes, meditation isn’t enough.

Adi is quite the duellist, one of the few in the Order who gives Mace a good workout, and here he can let go.

He meets her attack for attack, their fighting styles each as violent as the other.

“He isn’t the only one with some bad habits,” Adi comments a moment later as Mace, on the floor, struggles to recover his breath.

He throws a half-hearted kick and she somersaults, before intercepting his blade with hers. Her reverse grip is  so rare a habit in the Order that he always struggles to compensate. Her grin is feral. If they had more free time, he would offer to teach her Vaapad, but they can’t even find time to spar if not in the middle of the night, so it’s only a dream.

“All of us have started some trouble sometimes,” she continues, “Remember that time you organized and executed a palace revolution? You were, what, twenty? And it’s studied in some universities as an example of infiltration in modern warfare. ”

“I had a perfectly good reason,” Mace protests as he succeeds in cornering her in an angle of the room. He just has the time to move to save himself from her knee in an uncomfortable place, and Adi smiles.

“Come on, Mace, you can do better than that.”

Mace can't help but give a vicious smirk, and the violent dance starts again.

For a few minutes, Qui-Gon is forgotten as they exchange blows, marking the floor and the walls in burn marks. Drallig will probably yell at them tomorrow. The guy doesn’t even care that they’re on the Council. In the training room, he’s the only Master, after the Force.

Later, as they help each other with stretching, it’s Adi who starts the conversation again.

“I don’t think Qui-Gon needs to be benched. For one, he will go ballistic. I’m not sure I want to inflict him on the Temple in this state of mind.”

Mace snorts.

“You think he would stay? I bet you he would run away and become a space pirate or something equally as dramatic and ill-advised.”

“Not a pirate. Not scandalous enough. Perhaps a concubine of the Hapes Consortium Queen?” Adi offers, a smile gracing her lips. Mace tries to imagine Qui-Gon dressed in vaporous tulle and his mind crashes.

“Oh Force, please, no, the Consortium and the Republic would be at war something like two months after, just to force us to take him back.”

A giggle escapes Adi’s lips. They are at the level of exhaustion when the smallest thing seems funny.

“A nude model?” She tries, just to see Mace’s face. He snorts again, not particularly dignified, and heaves himself up from the floor with a dramatic groan. He used to be more resistant to exhaustion, but even the Jedi must bow in face of the effect of the years, even if they are more resistant to its damages. He offers her his hand to stand up, his mind stuck on her last idea. The idea of Qui-Gon as a concubine isn’t so outrageous: the man, despite the years, is a towering example of the species, graceful and leonine. If only he could make a little effort to present a little better, instead of looking like a spice addict half the time, just because he can’t be bothered by social niceties.

“We can’t exactly let him run around playing havoc like that. He will get his Padawan killed, or himself,” Mace starts again, as they slowly make their way to the living quarters of the Temple.

“Of course we won’t. But Micah wanted to handle the latest Humbarine commercial negotiations, didn’t he? And he’s Qui-Gon’s friend, as much as Qui-Gon accepts he still has friends in the Order, these days. And it could be good for the kid to work with other Jedi. Otherwise ten years from now, he will be full of bad habits that are impossible to break. Micah would be a good Jedi to learn from, to temper Qui-Gon’s influence.”

 

Master Jinn, Padawan Kenobi and Master Giiett go together to the Humbarine sector and Mace forgets about them and his worries about Qui-Gon’s mental state for a few days. There are reports to read, and sometimes redact, Senators to placate to stop them from doing too much damage, and Master Nu is threatening to cut him off from the Archives, again, just because he forgot to bring back some documentation. There is the Minos Cluster delegation, insisting on meeting with the Jedi Council, then Master Tholme who brings back terrible news from his mission against slavers, then Depa coming back from a solo mission with a broken foot and haunted eyes. There are just so many missions that the Jedi aren’t enough these days and the Council is constantly trying to square the circle, trying to put out the fires of the galaxy with not enough teams for half the crises happening everywhere.

Ten days after, the first point in the morning meeting of the Council is that Master Giiett and his team have missed their third check-in with the Temple. The Council dispatches a rescue team in the form of Master Mundi and three Knights.

When they come back, the story is full of space pirates, corruption, exploding speeders and burning buildings. The Jedi are persona non grata on three planets and two moons, Obi-Wan is missing his eyebrows and Qui-Gon half his whiskers. Someone broke Qui-Gon’s nose again - this is really a terrible habit, can’t the Jedi just learn to duck, for once? Micah’s face has been spared, but he is limping and glaring at Mace as if his fellow Council Member has thrown his lightsaber in a trash compactor. The collateral damage is costly enough that the Republic could have bought two small moons in an expanding sector for colonization, the Chief Accountant of the Senate explains to Mace Windu later, in excruciating detail. She’s a petite Rhodian, a third his size , and she always looks at Jedi as if they are some sort of clerical errors. It’s the first time someone tries to torture the man with numbers and he must admit, it’s surprisingly efficient. He leaves her office as if he is a Padawan guilty of crashing a prized ship, and not the Master of the Jedi Order.

“Ok, so that wasn’t exactly successful,” Adi comments later. It’s the middle of the afternoon, and Mace and Adi just visited Obi-Wan in the Healing Halls, where the Healers are testing the young Padawan’s cognitive functions after the multiple concussions the poor boy suffered during the mission.

“Micah is perhaps too close to Qui-Gon,” Mace admits. “He doesn’t fight his worst habits like he should. He still remembers him at his best.”

Adi stays silent for a second, then she offers: “Obi-Wan needs time to heal, and to spend time with his friends. I could take Qui-Gon to the Senate with me?”

“What is it, this month? I must confess, there have been so many urgent catastrophes these last two weeks, I’m a little late in my senatorial readings.”

“The entrance into the Republic of the newly founded Gatel colonies.”

“Ah yes. No risk of Qui-Gon making it capsize? We don’t need another world angry at us.”

“They’re peaceful, stable colonies, with functioning, strong democracies, and solid ethics. I don’t think even Qui-Gon could find something to insult them. They’re nice, boring people, whose principal export are sweets and whose only fault that I can think of is a tendency to pontificate.”

“I suppose even Qui-Gon can’t oppose sweets.”

Of course, three days later, Qui-Gon accuses the Gatel’s Prime Minister of having a child bride.

In public. Worse than in public: during the late stage of negotiation.

“What were you thinking?” Adi roars. It has been years since Mace has seen her yelling like that - not since they were Padawans and her first Master had been murdered.

Qui-Gon takes it in stride, accuses her of being heartless, cold, unforgiving, a Council puppet and other niceties. His voice is especially grating, since the Minister broke his nose when Qui-Gon confronted him. Qui-Gon broke the other man’s nose too, but it’s Judicial problem now.

“The correct solution was to approach Gatel’s Judicial services,” Mace tries to diffuse, before he has to stop Adi from killing Qui-Gon. “They would have arrested him, saved face, and continued the negotiations. Now, they’re vexed and they will probably need years before agreeing to join the Republic again, because you accused them of knowing and doing nothing, when you yourself only learned of it by the most outrageous coincidences.”

“No political gain is worth a single child’s suffering.”

“Nobody said that, Qui-Gon!”

“Just because you don’t have the heart-“

“The heart to what? To economically destabilize a whole sector for the pleasure of putting your first into that man’s face? You’re lucky your act didn’t make his arrest illegal or something like that, he would have walked out for a minute of satisfaction on your part!”

“Ah! Economics! Money!,” Qui-Gon laughs bitterly, his face twisted in an ugly expression: “Of course it’s about money for you. Money isn’t important, something you would have remembered before being on the Council?”

“Before being ashamed that so many important projects will crash down because you vexed an entire world? Thousands of jobs, Qui-Gon! The sector really needed them. You could have discreetly acted, the Judicial of their world would have been our grateful allies, he would have been in jail, like he is now, and thousands of fucking jobs would have been created!”

“Economics aren’t a Jedi prerogative!”

“Tell that to all the people struggling to put food on their table!” It’s useless. Qui-Gon isn’t even listening and adds something not very complimentary about Mace’s morals, instead of using that thing in his skull for thinking about the reasons for Mace and Adi’s anger.

That man could push anyone to day drinking, Mace thinks. He inflicts on Qui-Gon a dozen days of helping Jocasta in the Archives, and when Qui-Gon stomps out with all the grace of a Bantha, Mace makes a decision.

“We’re giving him another mission.”

“Didn’t he upset enough dignitaries? Which of our brethren’s missions do you want him to sabotage next time?”

“His own.”

“Sorry?”

“We’re not sending him on someone else’s mission this time. He will obtain his own mission and I will be the one going with him and young Kenobi.”

“Mace, it’s been a long time since you went on a mission,” Adi says tiredly.

He arches an eyebrow.

“Are you calling me a decrepit old man, not mission-ready anymore?”

“You know that I'm not. But the Council has so much work these days.”

“I know. One of the former members will have to sit in my place.”

She doesn’t seem convinced.

“Adi, it’s important. Qui-Gon isn’t himself.”

“I’m more of the opinion that he acts too much like himself. His ego needs deflating. He acts like he’s the only one capable of listening to the Force, the only pure Jedi or whatever the kriff he’s thinking, and I’m not sure he’s in need of _help_ , Mace. More of our foot in his -”

“Calm, Adi. You’re leaking anger all over the place.”

She glares at him, a glare that would send Sith running in the other direction, then she takes a breath, centers herself and he can feel her anger pushed into the Force.

“I want him back,” Mace says, slowly, “The man he was, not the caricature of today. Our slightly exasperating friend, not this idiot who will one day find himself bleeding out in a ditch. Some trauma can’t be forgotten, but it can be overcome. What sort of Jedi would I be if I abandoned one of ours to his fate, even a self-inflicted one?”

“A Jedi that guides all the Order and is not supposed to go gallivanting into space with half a maniac,” Adi hisses. It’s proof they’re getting older: when they were younger, she was most definitely the one with the bad ideas. That would have been totally her style. But years have taught her caution and hardened her. Mace prefers not to think about what age and years have taught him. He’s pretty sure Adi matured more gracefully, more wisely than him. When her Padawan is ready for the Trials, he hopes Adi will accept his place as Master of the Order. He claps her shoulder and tries to go for reassuring, missing probably by a long shot:

“Well, young Kenobi will be there, too.”

“Oh, if a Padawan is there to protect you, and to stop you two from coming to blows, I’m totally reassured. And I’m sure it has nothing to do with your over letting Yoda persuade you to not ask Obi-Wan to be your Padawan first, like you wished so much.”

She sits down on the nearest bench and he sits next to her, silent. They should be going back to the Council Room - the backlog of paperwork is growing, very probably, very certainly, as they stay there.

Finally, Adi sighs and he can feel her acceptance of his plan in the Force.

“This is a terrible idea,” she says.

“I’m out of smart ones,” he confesses and she has a small laugh.

 

Three days after, Mace is in the Archives, not checking on Qui-Gon but searching for an obscure, stupidly old Umbaran peace treaty, to resolve the latest crisis, when he bumps into Qui-Gon. He knew the other man was there, of course, but crises arrive on his desk by the dozens, so Qui-Gon Jinn can’t be always on his mind. Qui-Gon turns to him and the salutation on Mace’s lips stops cold. The other Jedi is busy wiping blood from his broken nose, trying his best to not let any droplets fall on the desk.

“Oh come on,” Mace grumbles, “In the Archives? How do you even….”

Qui-Gon glares and Mace closes his eyes, counts to ten. He had only five hours of sleep the last night, and the night before wasn’t better, two Jedi died yesterday on a mission, which Mace himself gave them, and half the Commenor Run is blocked by a bunch of idiots with a tax problem.

He opens his eyes again. Qui-Gon’s nose is still broken and bleeding. In the Archives. In the most peaceful place of the building, apart from the nursery.

“You know what? I don’t want to know. Go to the Healers, don’t go, I don’t care and I don’t want to know how it happened. You’re Master Nu’s problem for a few days still and I have a team of Jedi to advise on the latest Umbaran elections scandals. Try to keep the property damages to a minimum quota, thank you very much.”

And he goes into the shelving units.

 

A fortnight later, after a petulant Qui-Gon had whitened out Master Nu’s last black hair, Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan are called before the Council and offered the choice of a new mission in the latest roster. Qui-Gon probably sees that as Mace acknowledging he was right to punch the Gatle Prime Minister, letting him choose instead of assigning him one.

Mace prefers to think of it as a way to bait the hook.

He only tells them he will be going with them after Qui-Gon makes his choice - a grim mission about an organ harvesting ring operating from a moon somewhere in the Outer Rim. Otherwise the old Gundark would have chosen the mission he thought Mace would hate the most, instead of the one he would be the most interested in.

Late that night, Mace is reading the latest reports from the Mytaranor sector. Master Tholme is sure something nefarious is brewing, again, on Trandosha, despite Judicial’s Intelligence Agency reports, and Mace is quite of the same opinion. The reports paint a nasty picture, one that makes him want to reach for his lightsaber. He takes another sip of tea, eyes on his tenth report of the night, and grimaces when he realizes he forgot his cup too long and his tea is cold.

The sudden noise of someone banging down his door makes him spill on his holopad. He swears, something he would never do in public, or if he was more rested. He rescues the device and goes to the door to see which catastrophe just arrived.

Qui-Gon is at the door and for a second, Mace’s tired mind conjures a paranoid vision of the Temple under attack. His dreams have gone dark these last years, despite all the meditation he can squeeze into his busy schedule. The Healers diagnosed PTSD but sometimes, Mace isn’t so sure of their diagnosis.

“How dare you!” Qui-Gon spits instead of the tales of war Mace was almost waiting for, and Mace leans down against the doorframe, his second of panic firmly put behind him. Attacking the Temple, in the middle of Coruscant?! Who would dare?

“Good evening to you too,” he drawls dryly, “what can I do for you tonight, dear Qui-Gon?”

“You can forget this stupid idea of going with us like Obi-Wan and myself are some sort of feral beasts in need of a supervisor.”

“-And here we go, that would have been too simple-”

“Don’t take that sarcastic-“

“I’m sorry, was I supposed to bow to the insult?”

“Just because your soul shrivelled since-“

“Do you want to come inside?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“You seem two seconds away from yelling and I would prefer you don’t wake up the whole floor. It’s the middle of the night, Qui-Gon, people are sleeping.”

And without another word, Mace goes to his kitchen, leaving the door open. He pours out the cold tea, washes his cup and leaves it to dry. Instead of preparing tea again, he opens the cupboards and retrieves two glasses and, with a little more searching, an unopened bottle of wine, Depa’s gift for his last Life Day. It was almost a year ago - does he have so few occasions to celebrate something?

Qui-Gon is sitting on his couch, silent but glaring, and Mace feels something pinching his throat. The other man’s shields aren’t as tight as usual, probably because of the hour, and his sadness is a little overwhelming. Qui-Gon feels like he could shatter and Mace wants to gather him against himself like a hurt Padawan and swear to him he will help.

Only, it’s been a long time since Qui-Gon wanted any of Mace’s help, any of Mace’s anything, in fact. A long time ago, Qui-Gon and he were almost friends. Not as close as Mace is with Adi and Prossett, his crèche mates, not like Qui-Gon was with Tahl and Micah.

Nevertheless, there was something. Mace remembers countless hours of sparring together, hours of working together, side by side, on reports in the Archives, or pouring over philosophical treatises, debating together, always bickering, but so happily, he remembers…

He remembers that, at the time, there was always more, just out of reach. He remembers he thought they had time, time to grow closer, before words were said.

He also remembers how Qui-Gon distanced himself from everyone trying to warn him that Xanatos was going down a dark path. By the time the young man had slipped too far, Qui-Gon and Mace’s friendship was already dying, and Qui-Gon did his best to kill the rest.

Qui-Gon opens his mouth, probably to put his foot in it, and Mace waves the bottle like a peace offering, or more like a shield. He’s too worn-out to let Qui-Gon insult his parentage, his ideas, his principles or whatever else.

“It’s late, I’m tired, you’re tired. In addition, you’ll have all the time in the galaxy to be condescending during the mission. Take it like a trial from the Force if you want, because I half am.”

He puts the glasses on the coffee table, pours alcohol. It’s blue and sparkling. Depa’s idea of fun.

“That one is supposed to be poured colder,” Qui-Gon remarks.

“You’re incapable of not making a remark every two minutes, aren’t you? It’s some sort of tongue disease, a plague in your brain.”

“I’m just saying-“

“You’re not saying, you’re drinking. Bottoms up.”

Qui-Gon obeys, probably the first time in years he obeys any sort of order, and Mace does the same, before pouring again. The alcohol is a little too sweet for his taste, but not enough to stop him.

They stay in silence in the calm of the night, the undercurrents of the Force, always present, always calmer in the Temple, rippling around them in a never ending dance. Mace can see shatterpoints all around Qui-Gon, as always, but he’s no better at deciphering them tonight than any other day. Sometimes, he feels like Qui-Gon is tied to the fabric of the universe itself. One day, Qui-Gon will make a choice, or several, that will tip the fate of the galaxy. Mace can only pray to the Force that it won’t be with too much bloodshed, and try his best to help Qui-Gon, to let him become again the Jedi he was, to be sure Qui-Gon will be choosing, instead of reacting with his anger and contempt.

Like Mace was sure would happen, the alcohol pushes Qui-Gon on the other side of his exhaustion. Mace is, in theory, watching the late night traffic he can see from the window, but he’s in reality keeping an eye on Qui-Gon’s profile and he follows the fight of his eyelids against closing themselves. Qui-Gon has stupidly long eyelashes, for a human male; Mace has never noticed it before. Half an hour later, Qui-Gon is sleeping on the couch, the sleep of the half drunk, half exhausted, and Mace slowly, delicately, tips him into the pillows and goes to his bedroom, bringing back a blanket to cover him.

Then he goes back to his work. The next morning, he wakes up still at his desk, bleary-eyed and more exhausted than should be possible, his head on his datapad, and the blanket around his shoulders. He allows himself half a smile before starting the coffee maker and opening his messages to see what other catastrophes happened during the night that the galaxy thinks the Jedi should handle.

It would probably be easier if they went into their mission right at this moment, with the half tacit truce between them, so, of course, fate commands that their departure is delayed by some Senatorial nonsense, and a bounty hunter prone to so much violence even the bounty hunter league disavowed her.

It’s a long story that Mace will never, ever mention again, once his skull stops ringing. Adi pats his hand and comments that Qui-Gon is not always the one creating trouble. Mace would glare at her if only he could determine which Adi of the three he’s seeing is the real one.

They finally depart. It’s been four years since Mace had the occasion of a real mission, and he would prefer it in other circumstances, in circumstances where he’s sure he can trust his partner. The most vexing thing is that Mace could like traveling with them. Obi-Wan is a kind kid, thoughtful, smart. Qui-Gon is a pain in the ass, but he’s also a fascinating debate partner, even if these last years, he has been principally picking the debates to irate people as best he can.

If he was younger, Mace would be itching to arrive at their destination. Now that age and experience have curbed his impatience, a terrible fault of his younger years, he uses the travel time like a pause on a too busy life. They will need three days to arrive, and it’s been long since Mace had three days without paperwork, meetings and other horrors. He uses them for katas in the cargo hold. After he catches Obi-Wan watching him, he invites him to spar. Foreseeably, the younger Jedi isn’t a challenge, of course, but it’s good to fight as many Jedi as possible during the formative years, and there aren’t a lot of Jedi who use Vapaad, therefore not a lot of people Obi-Wan could use to train against it. For now, no Dark Jedi has picked Vapaad, but Mace isn’t arrogant enough to believe the lightsaber method he created can’t be picked by a Darksider, or be the favourite method of one his Fallen brothers or sisters one day.

Also, he likes training the red haired young Jedi. Adi wasn’t totally wrong about the past, about the ideas that sometimes had been in Mace’s head, about another Padawan, one with red hair and dimples. He loves teaching and still isn’t sure listening to Yoda when the other had pushed him to leave Obi-Wan free for Qui-Gon wasn’t his biggest mistake to date.

“Again,” he tells Obi-Wan and the younger Jedi picks himself up from the floor and assumes his guard again.

“Your defence is your weakness,” Mace comments, “but it isn’t really surprising for an Ataru user.”

“Master Qui-Gon says Ataru destabilizes the attacker enough that we never have to play defence.”

Mace snorts, not very elegantly, but keeps his expression neutral. He’s pretty sure Qui-Gon picked Ataru as his fighting style not because he had thought long and hard about the advantages and weakness, but just to ire Master Dooku. But he won’t say that to Obi-Wan, because speaking ill of a Master in front of his Padawan is rude, and Mace was raised better than that by his own Master.

He just attacks, disarms Obi-Wan, then puts his lightstaber in his hand again and dissects for the young man the attack he just executed and how Obi-Wan should have reacted. Later, he helps him with the diplomatic lessons on his datapad. He remembers that one, from when he was younger: he needed three attempts to pass it. Years haven’t made it more interesting, but his experience now offers plenty of examples to illustrate the theory for Obi-Wan, who absorbs it like a sponge.

Qui-Gon stays in his cabin during the entire trip. Mace suspects he only goes out for food during the night. He really hopes the idiot isn’t starving himself in some sort of protest.

“My Master is meditating,” Obi-Wan says on the second day, his eyes not meeting the Council Member’s own gaze, and Mace frowns and replies:

“It’s not your job to make excuses for the man, Padawan. It never should be. If Qui-Gon wants to be rude, he can accept the consequences of it like the adult he’s supposed to be.”

“Master Qui-Gon-“

“-is grumbling like an animal woken up too soon from his hibernation and sulking because he doesn’t appreciate my presence. My delicate sensibilities can handle this information.”

Obi-Wan musters a small smile and Mace offers to prepare lunch, as a way to comfort him.

“You mean you will heat the freeze-dried pack,” Obi-Wan remarks dryly.

“Aren’t you a cheeky one,” Mace says, poking him in the side, earning himself a laugh from the child, but he can’t stop his own smile. Perhaps he can still teach, if not Obi-Wan. Perhaps he should go to the Crèche when they come back, see if a young one resonates to him in the Force. Perhaps he can still teach Obi-Wan too, if Qui-Gon accepts that it could only be good for his Padawan to learn to fight against Vapaad. Perhaps even to learn Vapaad? Obi-Wan is years away from being ready for that, but Mace can see in him the beginning of a great swordsman, perhaps even better than Qui-Gon.

It’s very early in the morning when they arrive on site and meet with the Judicial officers who requested their assistance. The two male Twil’eks are grim-faced, eyes haunted by the case. They have been at it for months, and Mace would have sent someone sooner if he could, but the truth is, there are too many urgent cases for the Jedi. They can’t answer every one of them, no matter how they try.

The people being tracked by Judicial here are particularly gruesome. Organ harvesting criminals.

Probably the only bunch of criminals Mace despises as much as slavers.

“In retrospect, perhaps not a case most suited for a fifteen year old Padawan,” he remarks sotto voce to Qui-Gon, as they examine evidence. They should have skipped breakfast: the records of the latest discoveries from Judicial are pretty horrible. If the horrors of the world could still induce nausea in Mace, this would certainly do it.

“This is my Padawan’s and my decision,” Qui-Gon hisses immediately, but Mace can see his eyes on Obi-Wan. The Padawan is on the other side of the room, leaning over a display of butchering instruments seized as pieces of evidence, and his shields are tight enough to stop Mace from knowing how he feels about what he sees.

“Are you kidding me?” Mace answers, with a trace of anger in his voice that only Qui-Gon can provoke. “Are you really telling me you’re the only one in the world authorized to care about the kid’s wellbeing? He’s as much my responsibility as you are.”

“I’m not your respon-“

“But you are , you big slumbering idiot, like every one of you. Every time a Jedi is hurt or killed, their blood is on me, because of my decisions!”

Qui-Gon glares at him, but every chance of further posturing is interrupted. Because, how is this their life, a vehicle parked nearby explodes.

“I didn’t do anything!” Qui-Gon swears when Mace sends him a glare.

“Every time I let you out of the Temple, something explodes,” Mace remarks, but he doesn’t have time for more: the bomb was a distraction, and not even two minutes after the explosion, the Judicial Office is attacked.

“This never happens when I follow another Jedi on a mission,” Mace hisses and Qui-Gon has the audacity to bark something resembling a laugh.

“It’s because they’re doing it wrong,” he answers, sending Mace the first smile he has given him in years. Then it’s time for battle. Time to see if Adi was wrong to think Mace is not battle-ready anymore.

The attackers are a band of rogue Wookiees, yelling slogans Mace doesn’t exactly understand because he can’t keep up with the astronomical number of miscreants and rogue crews in the galaxy. He doesn’t need to know why they’re trying to kill them to kick their asses. Qui-Gon takes his left, covering him, without a second of hesitation, like they’re young Masters again, like no decades of silence has been lost. They’re twenty again, fighting space pirates posing as a mining guild in the Mid Rim. They’re thirty again, dismantling kidnapping rings all over the Outer Rim. They are two Jedi, back to back, ready to stop anyone trying to hurt others. The Force is crackling in their veins, blasters sing and Mace feel alive like he never does on the Senate floor, sinking deeper into his connection with the Force. It’s glorious. It’s humbling. It’s the eternal life-changing miracle of the Force guiding them.

Padawan Kenobi has positioned himself to protect the Judicial Officers, keeping his position a defensive one, reflecting stray blasterbolts with quick movements, offering the two older Jedi the opportunity to concentrate on the offensive. The attackers have enough firepower that they would have invaded the Judicial precinct easily, killed who they wanted to kill or stolen what they wanted to steal, and retreated before help came, but they hadn’t counted on two Jedi Masters. Soon, the tide of the battle is against the Wookiees. One loses his hand, and his blaster, another one is kicked into the nearest wall, a third is knocked off into a parked speeder. The attackers depart quite quickly after that.

“Stay with the officers,” the two Masters yell to Obi-Wan in the same breath, and they give chase to the retreating criminals. The attackers came on hoverbikes and they don’t concern themselves with safety on the road, but it’s the rush hour, and the dense traffic helps Mace and Qui-Gon keep them in their visual, even if they’re on foot, with the application of the Force to enhance their speed. There is something pleasant in jumping from roof to roof at Qui-Gon’s side. The work of his muscles, the Force narrowing their paths, his lungs working harder… Mace accepted his place on the Council because it’s important work, but that doesn’t mean doing something to make the world a better place, right here, right now, isn’t the sweetest  rush.

They make contact in a dark alley, Qui-Gon jumping and cutting cleanly, in a shower of sparks, through the prow of the first hoverbike. The engine roars in protest and immediately topples, throwing off its pilot and forcing the other two to overturn in an impressive pile-up. Mace has just enough time to throw out his hand and catch the Wookiees with the Force to stop them from breaking their necks, or at least a lot of bones. The taller one, more grey in his fur than black, immediately begins to insult Mace’s mother, in an original string of curses implying she conceived Mace with a space leech.

Mace doesn’t remember his mother, never even had the curiosity to search for her name in the Temple database, where every Jedi’s provenance and family tree are recorded, in case of future genetic illness, but that doesn’t mean he likes it. If he isn’t exactly nice when he puts them down, nobody can prove it, but he knows, and he grimaces and swears to himself he will add another half hour of meditation to his usual tonight. Criminals are rude, it’s in their C.V., perhaps there is even an obligation of it, and this is no reason to lose his calm. Mace contacts Judicial and puts his comm on beacon position, then he sits next to Qui-Gon on an overturned hoverbike to wait for a prisoner transport.

Qui-Gon is sweating, and there is soot in his beard, but his expression is less hard than usual as they let the adrenaline dial down, the sun warming their backs. Perhaps it’s because here, he isn’t surrounded by Jedi who know about Xanatos. Perhaps it’s time to try something, a small step, the smallest Mace can think of.

“The Wookiees were pretty surprised when you jumped behind the first bunch of them during the assault. Still Ataru I see?”

“Yes, of course,” Qui-Gon answers, looking at Mace like the question is stupid.

“It’s been a long time since I sparred with an Ataru-wielding Jedi as tall as you, want to go a few rounds when things are a little calmer?”

He sees Qui-Gon hesitate, but with the remnants of the fight still flowing in his veins, the answer he will give is pretty evident.

“Yes, why not,” and he doesn’t seem very sure, so Mace doesn’t push, letting the rest of the time pass in silence. The air smells of burnt rubber, but the Wookiees have stopped swearing, waiting too, in a sullen silence.

They catch a ride to the Judicial office with the prisoner transport. Mace talks with one of the officers about the crew, newcomers in town, but who had been sighted on other parts of the planet. Apparently, they’re in the habit of attacking Judicial or other law agencies to steal spices seized as evidence, to sell it without having to import it into the system or to synthetize it themselves. The Wookiees don’t have any link to the reason for their own presence on this planet.

“What's the chance that they would attack the precinct to steal their spices just the day Jedi are there,” one of the Judicial officers laughs, “talk about bad luck.”

Mace isn’t really listening. He’s observing the office. The fire has been stopped, but it’s still  organized chaos. People are yelling, the air is full of smoke, and a fight had broken out in the prisoner area, two Rhodians using the occasion to settle their differences about their common lover. Qui-Gon is busy speaking with another Officer, comforting her and bandaging a slight burn on her hand, and doesn’t seem concerned. In a minute, Mace will feel like an idiot and a mother hen, when Qui-Gon will give him a perfectly logical answer to the question, but he can’t not ask.

“Qui-Gon, where is your Padawan, where is Obi-Wan?”

Qui-Gon stops what he’s doing and Mace sees his gaze observing the room in a circle, again and again, sees the fear coming like the tide on a stormy sea, then Qui-Gon swears like a sailor, and Mace is of the same opinion.

 

People think the Sith are the Jedi’s biggest fear. This is grossly misunderstanding the nature of the Jedi, this is holding them apart from other living beings, as if they were _Other_. Perhaps in a way, thinking of them like that is easier, perhaps people don’t have to think on how the Jedi are raised to defend them all their lives, to die for them if necessary.

The Sith are the Jedi’s most terrible opponents. For all the Jedi’s powers and mastery of the Force, their most terrible fear is the same as every sentient. To lose their family, and in it, the youngest members.

Losing a Padawan, their own, or another, is a Jedi’s greatest terror.

 

Qui-Gon and Mace tear apart the seediest parts of the town, shaking the most powerful crime lords of the planet. Someone, somewhere, must know something, and someone will talk, even if they have to flex the Force and bare their teeth for it. They suspend smugglers of the Outer Rim from rooftops, by their feet. They growl at Wookiees. They trash a warehouse belonging to a Kiffar mob boss, even if that one is not totally done on purpose.

A long trail of criminals with bruises could be retraced behind them, offering a clear picture of the path they have taken across the town, and the Judicial officers follow close behind, mopping up.

To Mace’s infinite relief, he isn’t forced to stop Qui-Gon from going too far. He would do it, he knows he would, but the fact that Qui-Gon never tries to kill anyone, even in the throes of his fear, is the sign that he’s still, underneath, the Jedi Mace knew.

Also it’s best because Mace himself is feeling increasingly murderous himself as the hours pass, and he would stop Qui-Gon, but probably not before his fellow Master had roughed up the other guy pretty badly.

Where is their Padawan? Where is Obi-Wan? Where is the child they have the incredible mission, the great honour to protect and to train?

Mace tosses the next snitch indicated to them by Judicial out of a window. He catches her in her fall with the Force, but still.

He knows the numbers. The best chance at recovering a fellow Jedi is in the first hours. To keep a Jedi down, hidden, prisoner, the enemy needs so much power that killing them is often seen as more expedient. They know Jedi don’t retaliate by killing and every hour that passes is an hour when whoever took Obi-Wan risks thinking the young Padawan is more a problem than anything else.

Or worse, someone who is fully fitted to keep a Jedi prisoner, someone who specializes in it.

In this sort of disappearance, a Dark Force User comes to mind first. Or some slavers - after all, a Force-Sensitive slave is supposed to be a jewel without price, and Padawans make an easier target. Even if even a Padawan can’t really be broken. Mace had already, long ago, in a terrible mission, brought home the broken bodies of two Padawans that slavers had executed, since they couldn’t break them. Mace had been so close the bodies had still be warm when he had arrived. He vows that it won’t be the same with Obi-Wan.

This isn’t a Dark Side user. This isn’t a slaver organisation. This is Mace’s third nightmare: a mad scientist, foaming at the mouth but with a sharp brain.

That breed should exist only in those bad holodramas Adi watches as a guilty pleasure. Mace has difficulties understanding them. Do some people, when they’re children, or tadpoles or whatever larva stages their species experience, really dream things like “I will be very good at vivisection and evil laughter when I grow up. Later, I want to open people up to see what makes them tick, and to work with badly designed mechanical minions. My dream career is a nightmare-fuelling version of medicine designed to make people act like flesh-eating locusts.” This isn’t even the first mad scientist a team of Jedi had to fight _this month_!  Universities all across the Republic should reinforce the ethics courses in their science tracks.

Dawn is extinguishing the last star when they reach their goal. They have been up for more than twenty-six hours, but they draw easily on the Force to handle exhaustion.

Mace and Qui-Gon fall in the evil lair through the rooftop, lightsabers out, firmly decided to burn the place to the ground to be sure nobody can ever find a trace of these experimentations. It’s the classical bunch: mechanical horrors, man-eating flora, and some…. Well, that probably originated from the animal kingdom once, but whatever it was, it’s so mutated, so wrong, that killing it quickly is the only mercy they can think off. Room by room, they fight to the centre of the place, to Obi-Wan.

The poor boy is tied to a metal cross, in only his leggings, his mouth bleeding and bruises flowering on his torso. He should look like a victim, but the spark in his eyes is as defiant as his presence in the Force is unbroken. Qui-Gon and Mace split, Mace going to Obi-Wan, Qui-Gon protecting them from the mechanical minions. To the sweet music of a lightsaber slashing metal, Mace disengages the electrical restraints as swiftly as he dares, just sparing the time to be sure they aren’t bobby trapped.

“Sorry for getting taken,” Obi-Wan says, and Mace could toss Qui-Gon out of an airlock right now, because whose child offers an apology for getting kidnapped?

“Quicker,” Qui-Gon yells suddenly and Mace feels in the Force a great danger rearing its ugly head. Obi-Wan jumps from the cross and they turn to help their fellow Jedi, but it’s already too late. Mace has his lightsaber lit, but he understands it won’t work, because he can see, right across Obi-Wan’s heart, a shatterpoint blossoming, ready to burst, ready to shatter with the Padawan’s life. No time to deflect, no time for fancy blade work, and Mace does the only thing a Jedi can do in these circumstances.

He tries to trade, a life for a life.

Obi-Wan doesn’t have the time for surprise as the older man folds him against himself, curving his greater mass around the redhead, putting his own body between the kid and danger.

The pain pierces him right between the shoulder blades but he just tightens his grip on Obi-Wan, throwing them onto the floor.

After, he loses a little time. There are some terrible noises, metal bending, something burning and the smell of blood. He’s pretty sure the floor moves. Also, he may possibly be bleeding to death, but he’s feeling quite detached about it. He just thinks of Master Nu. He hopes he thought of bringing back the latest documentation he borrowed from the Archives before going on this mission, or she will never forgive him, even dead.

It’s quite possible he’s going into shock, his brain gallivanting from thought to thought.

“Don’t move,” a voice orders and Mace wants to laugh. Move where? Up and down have stopped making sense. He closes his eyes against the treacherous moving of the floor.

“Stay with me, Mace,” another voice says. It’s Qui-Gon. Qui-Gon. He was supposed to say something to Qui-Gon.

“Never letting you out of the Temple again,” he says and Qui-Gon’s hands are doing something and it hurts, it hurts so much, and Mace tries pushing him away, but he has as much strength right now as a baby Ewok.

“I know, I know, I’m sorry, I know that hurts” Qui-Gon whispers, his voice distorted, and there is blood on his face, his nose is broken, “It’s for your own good, kriff, the bleeding, kriff-“

“Not your fault, not the kid’s fault, not your fault,” Mace says, because he feels his life slipping away and he needs, he needs so much to have Qui-Gon understand. He won’t go like that, another weight on his old friend’s shoulders.

“Don’t say that,” Qui-Gon says, and Force, Force, he’s crying, his shields are down and his Force presence is rushing to Mace, familiar despite the years, trying to anchor Mace to this life.

“I missed you so fucking much,” Mace says between two coughs.

“Don’t –“

“All that we missed, Qui, we were so stupi-“ He can’t even finish the word. Qui-Gon has leaned down and Mace feels the flutter of lips against his, the kiss full of blood. The dark swallows him mid kiss.

  


The next thing Mace knows is the inside of a bacta tank, its taste coating his tongue and throat. Apparently, the Force isn’t ready to call him home just now. He floats for a time, trying to piece together the last events in a way that would make sense. He’s still half sedated but he can feel the way his body is purging the chemicals from his blood with the Force, years of training taking over.

He stays four hours in the tank. His wound wasn’t as terrible as they had thought at first, thank the Force, because the weapon was still experimental.

“It really didn’t feel so harmless,” he gripes to the medic after the first explanation.

“It’s….well, it seems it’s designed to kill people with maximum pain,” the other explains,” Torture and death in the same package."

Mad scientists clearly need to go up a few notches in the list of Mace’s least favourite types of bad guys. And how is this his life that he has a list of least favourite types of bad guys? He should have studied to be an Archivist. The most problems Master Nu has are her long-standing feud with Master Dooku and people guilty of the crime of eating in the Archives!

They release him at the end of the day, two days after. Between bacta and Force healing, he only needs rest now, something that is difficult for a Jedi to achieve here, in a place full of suffering like a hospital, especially for a Jedi as open to ripples in fate as Mace is. Healers and medics are covered in shatterpoints, always, for all the lives they touched, for all the lives they save and lose.

Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan insisted on staying in the ward of the hospital with him during the time of his recovery, sleeping on chairs next to the bacta tank, and Obi-Wan is sleepwalking more than anything else.

Mace can relate.

The only thing he wants right now is a bed. Even a sofa. The floor. It doesn't matter where exactly, but he needs to get horizontal, to sleep at least eight hours, even if he feels like eighteen would be best. Then meditation and tea, and then perhaps, but only perhaps, he will feel like a proper Jedi and a civilized being again.

They have two rooms, courtesy of Judicial, and Mace lets Qui-Gon help Obi-Wan to bed, and into a Force-assisted sleep, in one room, while he slips into the other. He needs a moment to compose himself. In each room, there is only one bed, but it wouldn’t even slow them down normally. Younglings are in the habit of sleeping in a pile, so sleeping with someone else has the reassuring context of easier years for Jedi. Even now, with the tension of that moment that Mace won’t name, there is something reassuring about being in the same room - to be sure Qui-Gon can’t get into trouble during the night!  

He’s kneeling in light meditation when Qui-Gon enters the room. He needs sleep more than meditation, but half an hour is still necessary, or his sleep will be troubled. That also offers the occasion to be sure Qui-Gon will be already sleeping when Mace enters the bed, something he does with a satisfied sigh a moment after.

He closes his eyes, and it is, of course, the moment he discovers Qui-Gon Jinn snores like a starship motor in need of repair, reaching a level of noise Mace didn’t know any species other than a Wookiee could reach. With all those times his nose was broken, this isn’t exactly surprising.

With a sigh, he rolls over onto his belly and puts his pillow over his head. In truth, he would prefer to put it on Qui-Gon’s head, and to press in a lethal way, but he’s old and trained enough to not do something like that.

Even if it’s really, really tempting.

After a moment, he needs to breath and he stops trying to smother himself with the pillow, and rolls to his side.

The three moons are high in the sky, and he can see Qui-Gon almost as well as he would in the sun’s light. Qui-Gon doesn’t stir even under the other’s eyes, something that should wake a Jedi: he must be exhausted too.

Mace stays there, watching him sleeping. He can  feel Qui-Gon's warmth from the other side of the bed. The two of them are tall, muscled- Mace would only have to reach a few centimetres to touch him.

He doesn’t. He just stays there, watching him.

Most of the time, people look younger when they sleep. Qui-Gon just looks tired, and Mace feels a wave of empathy for the other Jedi. Perhaps even tenderness. Perhaps even something he won’t put a name on. Dear old Qui-Gon, stubborn as fuck, courageous, unbelievable Qui-Gon, who loved Xanatos too much and tried to close his heart to other Jedi when Xanatos betrayed everything they stand for, betrayed Qui-Gon. Mace wants to offer help, but he isn’t sure what sort of help Qui-Gon needs. Perhaps Yoda is right. Perhaps their old friend’s soul is in the hand of a precocious red-haired child, too young for such responsibilities, too young to bear that weight, but at the end, the only one Qui-Gon will let try. Mace would like to help. More than he thought he did. More than he should want as a fellow Jedi. He wants more. He wants what could have happened years before, if not for Qui-Gon closing himself off after Xanatos’s betrayal. He wants to relive that moment again, when they thought Mace was dying and Qui-Gon kissed him.

Without the blood and the pain so intense he thought he was done for, if possible. He doesn’t remember how Qui-Gon tasted. He couldn’t, everything tasted of blood, from his lungs, from Qui-Gon’s broken nose.

Or perhaps he’s an idiot. Perhaps that starship sailed away long, long ago, perhaps they’re on two parallel trajectories, destined to never collide. He’s a member of the Council now. Every hour of his life is for the Order, for duty, for bringing peace to the Republic, for protecting his fellow Jedi. He’s not supposed to have time for anything else. He’s not even supposed to want anything else, no matter how his former Master tries to “shake sense into him about his isolation”, to use her words.

Mace doesn’t remember falling asleep, but next thing he knows, it’s the morning. They moved during their sleep. He’s facing the window and he can feel Qui-Gon, a long line of solid warmth against his back, and his presence in the Force, a little broken, a little dimmed, but familiar. Mace would give a lot to just close his eyes and let sleep claim him again. They can’t have slept more than six hours, he’s still exhausted, but there is work to do, Judicial needs their statement, and he needs to contact the Temple to be sure nothing too urgent needs his attention.

There is work to do.

There is always work to do.

He sighs, stretches and rolls over to stand up. He can feel Qui-Gon’s gaze on him for the ten steps needed to reach the bathroom, but the other man says nothing.

Mace closes the door of the fresher, reaches over to flick on the light, and leans back against the door. A moment of perfect silence, of perfect stillness. Then he opens it again violently, walks to the bed.

“Did you mean it?”

“Yes,” Qui-Gon says, defiance in his tone, like he thinks Mace will chastise him.

Mace kisses him.

No blood.

No pain.

He kisses him, he kisses him, he kisses him, holding the back of his neck, exploring the long hair. He kisses him until up and down make no sense anymore and he needs to close his eyes because his world is changing, and he feels like he will start to levitate.

He opens his eyes when he feels Qui-Gon’s shields opening again. They look at each other, on the edge of a fundamental change, and then Qui-Gon is the one initiating another kiss, his approach more forceful. Mace lets his shields fall open too and he groans at the sensation.

It changes nothing, of course.

Mace has too much work. Qui-Gon is the most stubborn Jedi that ever existed and he gives the Council grey hairs, or grey scales in some cases.

But now, in the dead of the night, when even Mace must give up on work, he has stopped falling asleep at his desk or passing out on his couch.

Now, the bed is warm, more enticing.

Now, when Xanatos’s too-beautiful face haunts Qui-Gon’s dreams, he doesn’t wake up alone. He wakes up, his lost Padawan’s name on his lips, his breath raggedly uneven. His hands clutch Mace’s arms with such strength that they certainly will leave bruises.

Mace doesn’t offer platitudes. He just goes in search of a glass of water, once Qui-Gon has found enough control to let him go, and then waits for him, leaning down against the sink when the other takes a rapid shower to wash away the sweat of the nightmares. He wishes he could help his lover wash away, in the same way, the memories that plague his nights, but only years and therapy can heal certain things. Qui-Gon has accepted a trial run of therapy, if Mace agrees to raise a Jedi not on the Council to the position of liaison with the Senate, instead of picking up that burden with the rest of his tasks.

They go to the couch together. There will be no more sleep tonight. Qui-Gon leans against the other Jedi and Mace lightly presses a kiss to his temple, wrapping his arms around him. Still and silent, they wait for the first light of a new day in Coruscant’s sky.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on tumblr, under the same username, come and say hi!


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